


So, So Fucked

by Anonymous



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-15
Updated: 2008-10-15
Packaged: 2019-10-27 22:12:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17775155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Pete accidentally "outs" himself and Patrick on Good Morning America. Only problem? They're not gay. What now?





	So, So Fucked

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, that's right. I wrote it! (*defiant chin-lift*) It's bandslash, bitches, who wants to make something of it? Huh? I fought like a wild animal to avoid this fate, but libgirl is an addiction and an enabler all at once, and I am only human. It's all her fault; shun her and make her ashamed. (You may also blame her and barmy_bunk for the encouragement and phone betas on this, although it is currently going up unbeta'd for SPAG, so the blame for any of those errors goes to me.)

It was a very bad day to be doing something like Good Morning America.

 

It wasn't anybody's fault in particular—just your garden-variety scheduling nightmare. They were all exhausted; they'd wrapped up the end of an absolutely grueling tour, literally _yesterday,_ and had gotten home _just_ in time to catch a flight on absolutely no sleep, after which a driver had met them at the airport and delivered them directly to the studio and almost straight onto the air. Pete in particular hadn't slept in almost three days, and the other guys had managed a few uncomfortable catnaps at best. They were all grimy and desperately in need of showers, Patrick's hoody was rumpled and smelled overwhelmingly of hastily-splashed-on cologne, and Joe's hair was defying gravity in at least three directions at once. Pete didn't even want to _know_ what his own eyeliner must look like.

 

They didn't do too badly, all things considered, until the audience question-and-answer segment came up. It was the very last question that started all the trouble.

 

"I know how strongly you guys have always advocated the gay rights cause," said a girl, who looked like nothing so much as a high-school journalist with dreams of a Barbara Walters future. "So I wanted to know your reaction to the Pride-in-the-Park concert lineup. I know you were among those who were very vocal in your outrage when Sean Granadine was murdered, and this cause must hit very close to home for you. Were you surprised when you saw who all was performing? Do you have any plans of supporting or promoting the event?"

 

Pete glanced at Patrick, drawing a complete blank. Had they heard about this? He didn't even know anymore—the tour had been a rough one, full of exploding amps and bus tires blowing out and venue cancellations and just about every other problem it was possible to face on tour, and Pete, for one, had sort of mentally checked out on the rest of the world in favor of just gritting his teeth and getting through the immediate crises. He hadn't even _heard_ about a Pride concert.

 

Patrick didn't look like he had any more of a clue than Pete did, but he supposed it didn't really matter. Sean Granadine had been a fantastic musician and something of a friend of the band, especially Patrick, who had worked with him a little on his latest album. His murder the month before had hit the whole band very hard, particularly as the details of the case came out—a senseless, brutal hate-crime, committed by a total stranger for no reason beyond being a "fag,"—and if there was a concert in the works to memorialize him, Fall Out Boy was totally going to be a part of it.

 

"Absolutely," he said firmly, slinging an arm around Patrick's shoulders. "We've been on tour, so you know, we haven't really had a chance to talk to anybody about it, but yeah. We want in."

 

For some reason, this statement was greeted with a wall of almost-silence.

 

"Are you...you're saying—to perform?" the girl stammered, apparently shocked.

 

Pete glanced at Patrick again, confused. Patrick seemed to take this as a request for support.

 

"Yeah, of course," he said, looking uncomfortable the way he always did when he had to speak to a camera. "We—totally, right? Sean was a friend of ours, we're mad as hell about what happened, and we absolutely want to do everything that we can. Performing would be great, but you know...it might be too late for that, or maybe—but we'll for sure be supporting it in any way we can, even if we can't arrange to do a set or something..."

 

Pete tightened his arm around Patrick's shoulders, sensing the onset of a runaway verbal train. Patrick hated it when Pete let him ramble too long.

 

"So, yeah." Pete locked his eyes on the camera and flashed a quick grin. "Call us, or whatever, right? Let's set something up, this is serious and important and we are totally on board. We want in."

 

The show ended pretty much immediately after that, and a strangely-tense Andy and Joe dragged Pete and Patrick directly to the car that was taking them back to the airport, allowing no interference along the way, even casual conversation or autograph signings.

 

The instant all the doors were shut behind them and the privacy screen was up, Andy whirled on them. "Are you fucking _serious?_ "

 

Patrick's jaw dropped; Pete was equally baffled. "What? What the fuck?"

 

Joe buried his face in his hands, groaning. Andy raked a hand through his hair.

 

"Oh, my fucking God. You have absolutely no idea what you just did."

 

Pete was getting worried in spite of himself. "So why don't you fucking tell us, then?"

 

Joe dropped his hands. "Totally serious, right now—are you guys, like, gay? Together, or whatever?"

 

" _What?_ " Pete exclaimed. Patrick just spluttered incoherently.

 

"Fuck." Joe dropped his face back into his hands.

 

"You fucking _idiots,_ " Andy practically snarled. "This is totally going to blow up and fuck over the very fucking event we just said we would be supporting. I can't even believe this."

 

"Somebody tell me what's going on," Patrick demanded, his patience clearly at an end.

 

"The fucking Pride concert, that's what! It's not--it's not, like, the Pride _parade,_ or whatever, where just anybody can jump in and be all supportive. It's a fucking _concert,_ in Sean's honor, in Central fucking Park, where all the fucking _gay and lesbian performers_ are putting on a show to raise money for the gay rights lobby, man. One hundred percent of proceeds go to fighting the bans on gay marriage and pushing for harsher hate-crime penalties and shit."

 

"And you just put your arm around Patrick Stump and said you wanted in," Joe concluded grimly. "On national fucking TV, dude."

 

"And _you!"_ Andy turned on Patrick, gesticulating wildly in an uncharacteristic rage. "Fuck, Patrick, we expect this kind of shit from Pete, but you just _went along with it._ Christ, we are so fucked!"

 

"I didn't fucking know what the hell it was!" Patrick shouted right back, white-faced with growing horror. "Fucking _Pride,_ that's what she called it, how the fuck were we supposed to know—"

 

"Jesus, man, it's been in the works for almost a month! Ever since the murder, practically! Where the fuck have you _been?"_

 

"I was on the fucking tour from hell," Patrick returned hotly. "Where the fuck were _you?_ Because _I_ don’t' remember having fuckloads of free time to keep up with current events—"

 

"Dude!" Joe burst out. "Don't try to blame _us,_ it's not _our_ fault you fucked us over—"

 

"Fucked _you_ over!" Pete's voice sounded high and shrill even to his own ears. "I don't remember _you_ being outed in a fucking gay love affair on national TV, you stupid—"

 

" _Shut up_." Andy sat back in his seat, pressing tense fingers to his temples and looking very much like a man who was trying not to murder his entire band in cold blood. "Just. Everybody shut up. By the time we get back, they'll have gotten a meeting together and we can figure out how the fuck to fix this, but I just.... Until then, just. Nobody talk."

 

Pete clamped his mouth shut and sat back in his own seat, trying to ignore the cold squirm of dread in his stomach. He couldn't believe this. God, the backlash from this was going to make the dick thing look like child's play.

 

And. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. The gay community was going to be in a fucking uproar. A fucking charity concert in honor of _the band's own murdered friend_ , and now their cause—their serious fucking cause, their efforts to promote the _very issues_ Pete was always supporting at the top of his fucking lungs—was going to look like one more stupid fucking Pete Wentz attention-whore douchebag joke.

 

He was so, so fucked.

 

—

 

 

Five hours, seven shouting matches, and two long meetings later, Patrick was no longer speaking to him and Pete had himself a brand new fake boyfriend.

 

It had been his idea to keep up the pretense, which was probably why Patrick wasn't speaking to him at the moment, actually. But Pete couldn't see any way around it. He was totally willing to own up to being a douchebag when it was only him that had to take the fall for it, but he absolutely _couldn't_ bring himself to let this entire mess cast even the slightest bit of negative attention onto the concert and everything it stood for. And, silent treatment or no, Patrick had to agree with him about that, or he'd never have consented to keeping up the show.

  
It was only another month and a half. After the concert was over and done with, they could drop the act and "come out" as straight again. Pete _would_ look like a douchebag, and for once, so would Patrick—which Pete was determined to find some way around, this was all his fault and Patrick shouldn't suffer for it any more than he was already going to—but in the meantime, hello gay lover.

 

It was fine. It would be _fine._ Honestly, it's not like half their fanbase didn't already have their suspicions. Pete had seen the fanfics. This was...this was, like, almost not a big deal at all.

 

Now, if only Patrick would see it that way.

 

—

 

 

Pete's first week as a gay man was actually relatively uneventful. At least, it was uneventful by _his_ standards.

 

He slept a lot for the first two days. Actually, pretty much the entire band did that, in an attempt to recover from the hell of the tour and all the subsequent gay-related trauma. Patrick eventually caved and started speaking to Pete again, although he did it with a certain air of resignation that Pete found he didn't much care for. He sort of would have preferred if Patrick had actually _wanted_ to start speaking to him again.

 

The internet had pretty much exploded in the wake of their "outing," and there had been a handful of interviews to deal with, but their publicist, Jill, was keeping a pretty tight lid on that side of things for them. There _was_ one awkward conversation with Pete's parents—("No one outside this room is to know that this is a lie," Jill had ordered. "But—" Pete had objected. " _No one_ ," Jill insisted grimly. "This is your fucking lie. You're going to have to deal with it.")—but they actually took the "news" surprisingly well, all things considered.

 

It wasn't until Thursday afternoon that things first started going a bit awry.

 

"You're meeting up with Andy and Joe in Chicago tonight," Jill announced, out of nowhere. "You'll be doing the Oprah show, it's filming tomorrow."

 

"What?" Pete blurted, horrified. "Oprah? Now?"

 

"Hey, I have shit to do tomorrow," Patrick added. "I'm scheduled to be in the studio with Jay-Z at eight—"

 

"Yeah, no," Jill said flatly. "Not anymore. Bob already handled it, it's moved to next week. Look," she added, when their expressions did not exactly reflect their unbridled glee. "This is a big deal. She's giving you the entire hour, and she's bumped her whole lineup so this can air on Monday. This is her way of supporting the cause, and she's got a big damn demographic at her fingertips. If you're serious about this at all, you'll do the show. If you're not fucking serious about this, then there's no point in pulling this entire act. So it's time to make the call. Which is it?"

 

They took the tickets meekly, and headed off to pack.

 

—

 

 

It wasn't that Pete wasn't used to doing interviews. The whole band was by now, really—even Patrick, who was arguably still the least comfortable with them most of the time—but Oprah...Oprah was kind of a whole different ball game.

 

It started off easily enough, with a quick acoustic of 'Sugar,' and some short introductions and small talk. But once they had moved past the basic bio stuff and a few explanations about the Pride concert and their working friendship with Sean, things got a whole lot more personal really, really fast. Pete found himself way out of his depth; you kind of couldn't help liking Oprah even if you wanted to, but it was frankly less like what Pete considered an "interview" and more like being quizzed by your curious and gossipy aunt in front of, like, a few million of her closest friends.

 

"So, when did you first look at yourself and really _know,_ really _identify_ yourself as bisexual?"

 

Pete leaned forward. This was one of those questions they hadn't had to field yet at this point in their deception, and there hadn't been a lot of prep time before this was sprung on them. He would have to keep this vague.

 

"I don't know if there was ever really one particular moment for me, not the way you mean," he said, making up his answer as he went along. "Like, it's never been any big secret that I didn't have a problem kissing guys or sort of hanging on them or whatever. I think I just kind of never really thought of it as a big deal, or, you know, thought much about it at all. I always said I was gay above the belt, you know, which was—I guess pretty much true, I mean, I was never full-out bisexual in that I had, like, sexual relationships with guys or anything. But you know, Patrick and I have always been about as close as it's possible for two guys to be, and I guess at some point I just sort of gradually realized that I was into him in a way that wasn't...you know..."

 

"Above the belt?" Oprah grinned, and Pete found himself grinning back in spite of himself.

 

"Pretty much, yeah."

 

"Patrick?"

 

Pete cringed inwardly—Patrick was a notoriously bad liar. He reached over without thinking, gripping Patrick's hand and lacing their fingers together. It looked good for the camera, and maybe he could, like, squeeze out a warning or something if this all started to go terribly wrong.

 

But Patrick only looked thoughtful for a long moment, and then said, "I was fifteen," in such a serious voice that Pete couldn't help glancing at him in surprise.

 

"So, it was much more specific for you, then?" Oprah prompted, interested.

 

Patrick flushed, and smiled sheepishly. "I had a total crush on my math teacher that year, Mr. McKendall." He coughed slightly, then gave a tiny wave at the camera. "Uh...hi, Mr. McKendall," he added ruefully.

 

Pete was stunned. Patrick in no way sounded like he was lying. But that would mean—

 

"But yeah," Patrick continued, his expression candid. "I was pretty confused and messed up about it—I had crushes on girls and stuff, too, so I wasn't really sure what to think, and it sort of messed with my head. Plus, that was, like, not an easy age for me anyway, at school and stuff; I was a total dork, and that's never fun. So as far as I was concerned, this was just one more thing that made me different, and that...was rough. But that's when I knew."

 

Oprah cocked her head. "That's about when the band came together as well, isn't it?"

 

"A little before then, but yeah," Patrick agreed. "Which, like. That totally made things harder in a way, because I couldn't tell any of the guys. When you're that age and basically living in a van with three other guys, you don't want anybody to, like, worry that you're...well... _looking._ You know?"

 

Pete could do nothing but stare at Patrick, completely and utterly shocked. He was probably blowing his own cover, but he totally could not help it.

 

How could he never have fucking _known_ any of this?

 

Oprah laughed. "And were you? Looking?"

 

Patrick spluttered for a moment, blushing brightly. "I...uh..."

 

"Oooh. That sounds like a _yes_ to me." Oprah deadpanned playfully. The audience laughed in obvious delight.

 

Patrick looked ready to burst into flames. "I...okay, fine," he admitted, tugging fretfully at the brim of his hat. "I kind of had a little thing for Joe for awhile."

 

Pete stiffened reflexively. "Wait, _Joe?"_ he demanded.

 

"Dude!" Joe exclaimed, leaning forward to peer around Pete. "I would totally have made an exception for you, man!"

 

Patrick grinned shyly at Joe, bright red and sheepish and biting his lip.

 

Pete kind of hated him just then.

 

"So, it wasn't Pete for you, right from the start?" Oprah leaned forward, fascinated.

 

"Well..." Patrick flailed a little. "Pete's _Pete,_ you know? I mean, look at him, obviously, but—y'know, it's like...I know who's out of my league, basically. It never really went to a crush place because, seriously...."

 

" _Hey!"_ Joe burst out indignantly.

 

" _Joe?_ " Pete demanded again, unable to help himself.

 

"Uh-oh," Oprah put in, wide-eyed and laughing.

 

"This is why Pete always does the talking," Patrick muttered, fussing with his hat again. His hand was clammy in Pete's, and the audience and Oprah were eating up the entire scene. Seriously, Jill could not have asked for a better performance than this. Patrick had just effortlessly charmed the entire room, blown the top of Pete's head off, and wrapped Oprah Fucking Winfrey around his little finger. It was all the best kinds of publicity wrapped up into one adorable little package, and Pete wished he could back up time and just make it all...not happen.

 

Or at least, not happen like _this._

 

"Oh my _god,_ " he burst out suddenly, as something truly horrific occurred to him. "Is that what you were doing when you started talking to him in the Borders that day? _Were you trying to pick him up?_ "

 

Patrick choked, and Oprah burst out laughing again, and Joe was leaning around to stare wide-eyed at Patrick, and Andy was laughing, quietly and hysterically, into Joe's shoulder. Pete just glared at Patrick and waited for an answer.

 

"I was _so not!"_ Patrick finally stammered out, indignant and horrified in equal measure. He turned frantically pleading eyes on Joe. "I didn't even—you weren't—I swear, I never—oh my _god,_ we are not having this conversation!"

 

"We are totally talking about this later," Pete said darkly.

 

Oprah was still snickering as she broke for commercial.

 

"So tell us how it finally happened for the two of you," was her first question when the cameras picked back up.

 

Pete jumped in before Patrick could take this one. He shouldn't have done what he did—he knew he was reacting from some kind of weird, irrational competitive impulse, wanting to show up _Joe_ for some reason, which was just _stupid on so many levels_ , and he was totally going to end up regretting this later—but he couldn't help himself.

 

"It was after a show," he said, forcibly ignoring the little voice in his head that kept going _keep it vague keep it vague keep it vague._ "I've always been a little in love with Patrick's voice, ever since the first time I heard him sing, and he was just really _on_ that night, you know? And I was standing there on stage, just totally blown away all over again, and when the show was over I ended up standing next to him in this little hallway and we were alone, and I just, like, kissed him. I couldn't help myself."

 

"Wow. And Patrick, what was your reaction to that?"

 

"I was very surprised," Patrick said dryly. "Like, that is _totally not how I would have said that would happen._ " He was actually the one doing the Warning Squeeze.

 

Oprah just grinned. "And had you been _looking_ at him yet, by this point?"

 

Patrick blushed again, charmingly. "You would have to be totally blind not to look at Pete and see...that." He made a flaily sort of gesture with his free hand in Pete's direction. "So, y'know, I looked, I mean, in the way you can't help looking at someone who happens to be completely hot, but I was still really....like, I don't think I'm, whatever, scaring small children with my _face,_ or anything—at least, I hope not—but I'm. Like. Nowhere near Pete's level. And I'm really aware of that, and he's like my best friend, so that was sort of like a wall in my head I never really got over. You know?"

 

Oprah smiled. "So, when he kissed you..."

 

"Total shock," Patrick said awkwardly. "No idea what to think."

 

She turned back to Pete. "Did you even know he was bisexual when you kissed him?"

 

"I honestly didn't even think about it," Pete said, and okay, the thing that was totally freaking him the fuck out right now? Was that he could completely see the entire scene he was describing, unfolding his mind, and that was new and different and scary on at least three or four dozen levels. "I wasn't really thinking at all, I just _did_ it. And he kissed me back, and that was pretty incredible, because you know, he has that _mouth—"_ and oh, God, now he was thinking about Patrick's _mouth,_ and he really hadn't even known that was floating around in his head somewhere, waiting to pop out, Jesus— "and then that was it, I was basically his forever, or whatever."

 

The audience _oohed_ and _awww'd_ for a minute, and then Oprah turned her attention to Andy and Joe.

 

"How about you two? Did you know all of this was going on while it was happening, or was there an 'oh, by the way, we have something to tell you guys' moment later?"

 

Andy smirked at Pete. "We didn't exactly _know_ anything, in that nobody ever said anything specifically to us," he said sweetly, and Pete could hear _revenge_ in every word. "But it was really obvious to anyone who happened to be paying attention, and when you live in really close quarters with three other guys, you pay attention pretty much whether you want to or not."

 

"So there were obvious signs."

 

"Oh, yeah. By the time I joined the band, Pete already had, like, little cartoon hearts in his eyes every time he looked at Patrick, even if they didn't know it yet themselves. He's not, like... _subtlety_ isn't really Pete's most shining personality trait—he's done nothing for years but tell everybody who would listen to him how wonderful Patrick is, and hang all over Patrick and drag him everywhere and stuff. So yeah, we pretty much knew."

 

"Plus," Joe put in cheerfully, "Pete was practically announcing it to the fans all by himself. He was always answering Q&As from our website with these...like. Somebody asked him once if he was stuck on a deserted island would he rather have, like, Patrick with him, or an iPod with his favorite songs or whatever. And Pete was like 'Oh, that's a trick question, Patrick is already an iPod of my favorite songs,' or something, right? Stuff like that. Which, yeah, I mean—he was joking, but kind of not. You know?"

 

It was Pete's turn to blush. He felt very uncomfortable all of a sudden and, like, weirdly exposed. Which was stupid, but. Also, he was abruptly very, very aware of Patrick's hand, warm and solid in his own. For some reason, he couldn't quite look at Patrick just then.

 

Thankfully, the interview was very nearly over. They fielded a few more questions about Sean's murder and how it had affected them, their "decision" to "come out" in support of the Pride-in-the-Park concert, and then they did another quick song to close out the show.

 

Pete found himself every bit as aware of the sudden _absence_ of Patrick's hand as he had been of the presence of it. It was an unnerving experience.

 

They didn't stick around for too much chatting after the show, citing the need to visit their families at least for a few minutes before they were back on a plane to LA, and Oprah hugged them both warmly as they said goodbye, telling them how amazing she thought they were for doing all of this.

 

Pete felt a little sick inside as he smiled his thanks.

 

—

 

"So," Pete said tensely, into the sudden silence of Patrick's car. "You're gay."

 

Patrick's fingers tensed on the wheel. "Bisexual," he corrected coolly.

 

"You never _told me._ "

 

"That's because it had nothing to _do with you._ "

 

"No," Pete returned bitterly. "Apparently it had plenty to do with _Joe_ , though."

 

"Hey, whoa," put in Joe from the backseat. "Leave me out of this lovers' spat, dudes."

 

"Ignore him," Patrick said flatly to Joe. "He's just being an idiot. Look," he added, directly to Pete, "I don't know what you want from me, and neither do you. There was never gonna be a right answer to that question for you, and you know it. If it actually _had_ been you I had a crush on, you'd be sitting here freaking out about _that_ right now, so, like. Shut the fuck up. You know?"

 

"I would not," Pete said sulkily. "Jesus, Patrick, I'm _straight_ and I basically have the world's biggest crush on you. You heard Andy and Joe in there, Christ, I'm practically carving our initials into the internet together. You really never had even the _slightest_ little thing for me in all these years?"

 

Patrick turned to shoot him an incredulous glare, but something in Pete's petulant expression must have melted some of the frustration away, because he softened to the point of almost actually smiling. "You really _are_ an idiot," he said fondly.

 

Pete couldn't help but notice he never answered the fucking question.

 

"I still can't believe I had to find all this out on fucking _Oprah,_ " he muttered.

 

Patrick sighed. "I would have told you guys if it ever...like. The handful of guys I've actually dated never—it never went anywhere. I think the longest I ever dated any one guy was maybe four or five dates, that's it. If I'd ever met someone and actually—it was actually a _thing,_ you know, I would totally not have tried to hide it. I just didn't see any reason to risk freaking you guys out when it wasn't even really relevant. You know?"

 

Andy sounded offended when he said, "I _hope_ that when you say 'freak you guys out,' what you _really_ mean is 'freak Pete out,' because otherwise I'm totally gonna take back all the wise and supportive things I was just about to say to you. You should know me better than that, and Joe, too."

 

"What the _fuck,_ " Pete snapped, whirling. "Why the fuck would _I_ be the one to freak out?"

 

"Because you're the one always kissing on him and, like, hanging all over him and shit," Joe pointed out reasonably. "If you did that shit to me and I was actually gay or whatever, I'd be weirded out about telling you, too, dude. Just in case you got weird about it, right?"

 

Patrick was, tellingly in Pete's opinion, not saying anything at all. Pete immediately turned on him.

 

"Is that true?" he demanded dangerously. "Did you really think I was going to be the one to freak out?"

 

Patrick kept his eyes locked on the road. "I thought," he said, very carefully, "that you would be the one with the most _reason_ to freak out, if anybody was going to. By the time I was comfortable enough with you guys to even _think_ about telling you, you were already—well, you have a certain...I was—" He sighed. "I _liked_ our friendship, the way it was. You're like a monkey sometimes the way you climb all over me, and I've sort of hated the hell out of being your big gay joke all these years, because seriously, _actually kind of gay,_ you know? But I didn't, like, want you to _change,_ and I guess I figured you'd take it okay in that you wouldn't be, like, mad or anything, but you'd probably feel weird about hugging me or whatever, much less all that other shit you do. And I didn't want you to feel weird about that stuff. So. I didn't...I just didn't say anything."

 

Pete had his mouth open, all ready to launch a really vicious diatribe in Patrick's direction for even _thinking_ such a thing—like, didn't he know Pete at _all_?—but then, just as he was about to let it fly, a completely different realization came sailing out of nowhere and pretty much knocked him on his ass.

 

"Are you trying to tell me that you didn't admit you were bisexual because you, like, _wanted_ me to keep hanging all over you and kissing you and touching you and shit?"

 

Patrick wrinkled his nose, flushing slightly. "Dude, don't make it sound like _that,_ " he muttered, but Pete had already heard exactly what he wanted to know in that answer.

  
For some reason, he couldn't quite help throwing a faintly-victorious smirk over his shoulder, right at Joe. Even more mystifyingly, Joe immediately started laughing.

 

"Are we all cool here, or what?" Patrick broke in, sounding weary and long-suffering, but also just the tiniest bit insecure.

 

"Of course we're cool, dude," Joe assured him, and Pete and Andy were quick to agree. Pete actually sort of wanted to reach out and take Patrick's hand again in reassurance, but that would probably be a really weird thing for him to do. He settled for leaning across the center console and laying his head against Patrick's shoulder as nonchalantly as he could, as if to say, _See, I don't find this weird or different at all right now._

 

The thing was, though, he kind of _did._ Not in, like, a freak-out way or anything. Just...a new awareness of Patrick's physical presence. The warm, broad shoulder beneath his head. The flex of muscles in Patrick's thigh as he shifted his foot from the gas to the brake. The soft, steady rise and fall of his own head with Patrick's rhythmic breaths. The rough, calloused fingers wrapped around the steering wheel. Pete was just suddenly very conscious of all of those things.

 

It was unnerving. But kind of amazing.

  
He closed his eyes and refused to think too deeply about why.

 

—

 

The Oprah interview turned out to be a huge hit. People were absolutely enchanted with tale of their imaginary romance, and Patrick in particular developed an entire battalion of rabid young fanboys popping up alongside the more familiar fangirl following. The Q&As were inundated with an influx of questions, messages, and outright propositions for him:

 

_Patrik cos of u i told my famly i am gay i owe u so much thanx 4 makin me feel liek i can be myslef. i luv u dude if pete fucks this up u can call me._

 

_Omg Patrick, Pete doesn't deserve you, please call me! My number is 555-7362 and I will do anything you want, just please call._

 

_Patrick, hi! I just wanted to say I love you so much, I think it's wonderful what you two are doing, and you guys were so cute together on Oprah! But I felt so bad when you talked about him being out of your league, and I just wanted to tell you, you are totally hotter than anything and I have been in love with you for years, you never ever have to worry that anyone is out of your league because you are perfect. Pete is pretty, but if anyone is out of anyone's league, you are out of his. (Sorry, Pete!) Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you and tell you that!_

 

Pete scowled at his screen, then replied to the last one almost against his own will.

 

_no apology necessary i totally agree, he could do way better than me. i hope he doesn't, though. --xo_

 

He posted the reply, then closed his laptop and called Patrick instead. Patrick sounded disgruntled when he answered the phone.

 

"Hey, dude," Pete said cautiously.

 

"Listen to this," Patrick muttered crossly. " _The revelation that Pete Wentz is not-entirely-straight may not come as much of a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention to the girls' jeans and the eyeliner over the years, but his taste in men certainly does. His recent, highly-publicized outing, together with his best friend and lead singer, the stocky and aptly-named Patrick Stump, has some fans more than a little bewildered. "It's just, he could do so much better," speculates Gordon Hanover, longtime fan of the group. "I mean, Patrick has a great voice, but...what else is there to see in him?" We've been wondering the same thing! But you know, there's no accounting for taste. Maybe Pete likes 'em pudgy, bald, and sweaty—but we wouldn't be surprised to see him upgrade to a newer, shinier model sometime soon."_

 

"What. The. _Fuck,_ " Pete snarled, shock and cold rage slamming through him with an almost-physical jolt. " _Who the fuck wrote that?"_

 

"Gossip column in a teenie rag," Patrick said dismissively, but he still sounded hurt. It sort of made Pete want to, like, destroy the planet a little bit. "Whatever, it's nothing I didn't expect."

 

"Fucking _bastards,_ " Pete spat. "I'm going to find out who wrote that shit, and—"

 

"Do absolutely nothing," Patrick said firmly. "They're not wrong, Pete, I said it myself on national TV. It's fine, forget it."

 

"I _won't_ forget it! That's bullshit, and you are _totally_ wrong, so are they, those motherfucking little cunts, I can't even believe—"

 

"Let's just not talk about it anymore." Patrick sounded very tired.

 

"No, but Patrick, seriously—you should read the Q&As, okay, because—"

 

"Pete."

 

Pete gritted his teeth. He hated it when Patrick got like this, totally down on himself for no good reason, like he honestly had no fucking clue how absolutely amazing he was. It would be days before Patrick was really over it, and even then it would still be lurking around in the back of his mind, feeding into every insecurity he had, and Pete would never be able to say a word to refute it. Not one that Patrick would be willing to listen to, anyway.

 

"Anyway, I'm supposed to tell you, Jill's been talking to _Rolling Stone_ and the _Advocate,_ but that's pretty much gonna be it for us for interviews on this thing. I don't want to make a bigger thing out of this than we already have. The further we dig ourselves into this hole, the worse we're gonna look when the truth comes out."

 

"Fine," Pete said tightly. Mentally, he was still busy beating a certain asshole reporter and magazine editor into a little bloody, pulpy mess, and he was barely paying attention anymore.

 

"I'll let her know you're on board, then. _Rolling Stone_ will be the whole band, but I think it'll just be us for the _Advocate._ Then we should really get back into the studio. It's gonna be a busy month getting ready for the Pride thing, so any head start we can get would be awesome."

 

Pete grunted his approval and made the appropriate goodbye sounds as the conversation ended. Then he reached for his laptop.

 

_Fucking bitches,_ he thought grimly, opening up a new blog entry. _You have no idea who you are fucking with._

 

—

 

Pete's Sidekick rang shrilly, waking him from what was, for once, a totally sound sleep.

 

"Mmrph?" he mumbled into the receiver, not even bothering to open his eyes.

 

"Your blog post has just topped every single major entertainment website on the internet," Andy said brightly in his ear.

 

Pete dragged his eyes open blearily, peering at the clock. "It is six-thirty in the fucking morning, dude," he managed croakily. "Somebody better be fucking dead."

 

"Oh, I'm thinking _you_ will be, as soon as Patrick sees this," Andy assured him. "Pete, what the fuck were you thinking?"

 

Pete blinked gritty eyes and tried valiantly to hunt up some thoughts and string them together. "Didn't you hear what those magazine fuckers said about him?"

 

"Yeah, totally, whatever dude, they were bitches. But, like." Andy paused. "You realize you're not _actually_ dating Patrick, right? I mean, you remember that part and everything?"

 

"What?' Pete struggled into a sitting position. He failed halfway there, and just sort of slumped over. "Dude, yeah, what the fuck?"

 

"Allow me to refresh your memory." Andy cleared his throat ostentatiously. "Subject line: _i hate you (a love song)._ Is this ringing any bells yet?"

 

"I remember the post," Pete grunted. "I was mad, it was..."

 

"Tonight I had to listen to the love of my life read an article out loud to me," Andy continued blithely, talking right over Pete. "It called him 'pudgy, bald, and sweaty,' and asked what there could possibly be to see in him. So this one goes out to the fucker who wrote it, and anybody else who played a part. Because he _believed_ you. He believed you, and you did that to him. You broke him a little, and I can't fix it, I can't fix what you said. So this is my love song, I'm telling it to you because he won't let me tell it to him, and I hope you choke on every fucking word."

 

"Andy, I remember the post, I said." Pete was flushing a little in spite of himself, even as he said it. It sounded _different,_ hearing it read out loud like that.

 

"Yeah." Andy paused. "It's quite a list, actually. Very romantic. You got something you maybe want to tell me, Pete?"

 

"Fuck you. I was pissed off. And it's not like—it's not like I was _lying,_ except about, y'know, the dating thing. But it's all _true,_ and besides, I'm supposed to be his—whatever, lover or some shit. I had to do _something_ —"

 

Andy snickered. "You describe his mouth as a wet dream," he pointed out. "All true, is it, dude?"

 

Pete scowled ineffectively at the phone. "Shut up, fucker, I'll take the post down."

 

"Oh, it's _way_ too late for that. The text is copied _everywhere_ , man. I just wanted to give you some warning, because seriously? I'm thinking Patrick's coming over with a baseball bat pretty much the minute he wakes up."

 

Pete blanched.

 

"This might be a good time to write up that will you've been talking about."

 

Andy hung up before Pete could do anything but splutter. He reached immediately for his laptop, _again._ He needed to get a handle on the damage before Patrick really did wake up and see it.

 

—

 

 

Andy had not been exaggerating. Pete skimmed with growing horror, finding his own words staring at him from basically everywhere. He'd never seen anything like this before in his life. His actual blog had received more than three thousand comments just since last night. Apparently, appearing on Oprah really _was_ the ticket to completely unprecedented levels of fame.

 

He was in the middle of a frantic brainstorming session, trying to figure out if there was _any_ possible way to salvage this, when a shadow fell over the doorway to his bedroom.

 

Pete looked up from his screen, wide-eyed, to find Patrick standing in his bedroom doorway, deathly silent. He winced. It figured that the first time Patrick would use the key he'd been given would be to let himself in to kill Pete.

 

"Don't be mad," Pete blurted immediately. "Dude, I was just—I was _so pissed,_ I didn't think it would...like. I _never_ imagined that— _this_ would happen. I swear to you, I really didn't mean to make this worse."

 

Patrick took a very long time to reply. He walked across the room in what felt like slow motion, sitting down on the bed next to Pete before finally speaking.

 

"I have absolutely no idea what I am supposed to say to you right now," he said, his voice low.

 

Pete cringed, but at least Patrick didn't appear to have a baseball bat on him, and he hadn't punched Pete in the face yet, either, so that was something.

 

"I got a phone call this morning," Patrick added eventually. "A personal apology from everyone involved in the writing of the article." He sighed. "You can't—Pete, you can't—people are going to say shit. You know? You can't just _do_ shit like this because you don't like what somebody said, or because I don't know how to, like. Handle criticism well. Whatever. You can't—" He broke off, scrubbing a hand over his face.

 

"But—" Probably Pete shouldn't try to defend himself right now, he was already getting off _way_ easier than he deserved after a stunt like this. "But...you've defended me," he said anyway, unable to help it. "You've gotten plenty pissed about all the stuff people have said about me over the years, and done entire interviews about how much it pisses you off, and—"

 

Patrick slanted a sideways glance at Pete, and laughed, low and embarrassed. "I never went as far as to say your mouth was a wet dream, you asshole."

 

Pete blushed brightly. "I was...in character," he muttered. Patrick snorted.

 

"Whatever, my _mother_ read that post."

 

"Oh, fuck." Pete buried his face in his hands, horrified, but also couldn't help being relieved at Patrick's laughter. He looked up, crestfallen. "I _am_ sorry, you know."

 

Patrick nudged him with his shoulder. "Forget it," he said. "It's not like...I mean, thank you and everything. For the thought."

 

And then, after only the slightest hesitation, he leaned over, cupping his hand around the back of Pete's neck, and brushed the lightest, most chaste of kisses, just across the corner of Pete's mouth. Pete forgot to breathe.

 

Patrick didn't let his mouth linger against Pete's skin, but he did press their foreheads together for a moment when it was over. His eyes were warm and fond and smiling as he looked at Pete.

 

"Sorry," he murmured, and laughed quietly. "I was in character."

 

And then, before Pete could pull the scattered remnants of his brain back together, Patrick stood up and was gone.

 

Pete stared at the empty doorway for a long moment, and then fell back against his pillows with wide eyes.

 

He was so, so fucked.

 

—

 

It really didn't take all that long for the blog post to fade out of the immediate limelight. Within three days of it first going up, four new celebrity scandals had broken, and each progressive one carried the flood of public attention further and further away from Pete's little internet temper tantrum.

 

Two weeks after dropping their bombshell, life had almost resumed a normal state entirely.

 

The _Advocate_ interview was done and over with, and had gone incredibly smoothly, all things considered. The _Rolling Stone_ interview had gone even better, even if the photo shoot for that one gave Pete more than a few heart palpitations.

 

Really, it was practically no different at all from a thousand other pictures they had posed for over the years—there were certainly enough shots in existence of _Pete_ draped all the hell over Patrick from virtually every angle and direction—but something just _felt_ different about this one to Pete. It was a simple shot: Pete standing, shirtless and barefoot in a pair of loose white linen pants, with Patrick standing behind him, arms wrapped around Pete's waist and chin perched on his shoulder, a plain white fedora sitting at a jaunty angle on his head. Pete in the photo was eyeliner-free for once, and looked somehow more open and vulnerable for it. Patrick's expression was soft and relaxed, and Pete was a little breathless every time he looked at it for reasons he didn't totally understand.

 

He'd asked for a copy of the picture, though.

 

On the whole, things were busy and hectic, but relatively drama-free. Plans for the Pride concert were in full swing—somehow, in the wake of Pete and Patrick's recent and incredibly public "outing," Fall Out Boy had become the headline act, topping out even Melissa Etheridge and the Indigo Girls and other long-since openly-out performers—and between preparing for that and trying to get a head start on their studio work, there was very little time for any outside chaos to sneak in.

 

Which was why walking into the studio to find Patrick bent over his laptop, working away industriously with _fucking Joe Trohman_ leaning familiarly against his back, face pressed in close over Patrick's shoulder until their heads were practically touching, came as such a slap in the face to Pete.

 

_What the fuck,_ Pete's brain shouted, and it wasn't until Patrick glanced up in confusion and replied, "What?" that Pete realized he'd actually said it aloud.

 

Joe ducked his head abruptly, biting his lip but not moving even a little from his position.

 

Confusion and mortification were locked in an epic battle for supremacy at the front of Pete's brain, which pretty much resulted in a complete white-out of anything resembling thought. He opened his mouth several times, only to close it again upon discovering that he had absolutely no idea what to say.

 

Patrick's eyebrows went up. "Seriously.... _what?"_ he asked, obviously bewildered and beginning to verge on worried.

 

Joe looked back up, locking suspiciously-merry eyes on Pete's face and, very deliberately, lowered his chin to rest on Patrick's shoulder.

 

Pete felt like someone had punched him in the stomach.

 

_Get your hands off him,_ he wanted desperately to snarl, although at least this time he managed to keep the words inside his head where they belonged.

 

They were no less jarring or shocking for all that, though. In a single breathless instant, Pete's entire world turned itself firmly upside down—and stayed there.

 

"I have to go home," he said stupidly. No fucking way could he work today. Not like this.

 

"Pete?" Patrick _was_ worried, now, but Pete couldn't look at him.

 

"I'm fine," he blurted quickly. "I just—feel like shit, kind of. You know. Probably...coming down with something, or whatever. I'll. I'll call. Later."

 

He fled the studio before Patrick could ask any more questions.

 

_I'm not gay!_ he thought, frantic and bewildered as he launched himself into his car and peeled out of the lot. _I'm—it can't be real, it isn't—I'm not...Gay means sex! I don't—I don't even—!_

 

He squeezed the wheel with two white-knuckled fists, and tried not to hyperventilate.

  
Because the truth was, just the memory of Patrick's mouth brushing softly over his, of Joe's chin lowering to rest on Patrick's shoulder, of Patrick's eyes all crinkled at the corners and smiling into his—it was enough to make the truth come suddenly and starkly into focus.

 

Whatever else this could or couldn't be, it was very, very real.

 

—

 

Pete didn't come out of his room for three days.

 

He told everyone he was sick, and just wanted to be left alone. Then he climbed into bed, buried his face in Hemmy's fur, and slowly began the process of redefining everything he'd ever assumed he knew about himself.

 

The first day, he didn't accomplish much beyond a few really spectacular freak-outs. By the second day, he was actually angry at himself for taking this so badly—he'd been dancing on the edge of this particular line for years, and how could someone who was so staunchly and violently opposed to gay-bashing of any kind be so horrified at the thought that he might be gay—or at least bisexual—himself? He spent most of that day writing hideously self-loathing blog entries he couldn't post, and song lyrics he could never show to Patrick.

 

Day three saw a spark of slightly more sensible reaction, beginning with the realization that he didn't actually have any idea what the fuck he was doing. Like, he _knew_ about gay sex, because everybody knew about gay sex, but that was, you know. Not _helpful,_ so much.

 

The gay porn sounded like a really good idea at the time. Proactive. Educational, even. He downloaded almost a dozen full-length videos to his laptop, rationalizing that the broader the selection he had, the more informed he would be.

 

Four minutes into the first video, Pete's eyes were roughly the size of saucers, and he was reaching for his Sidekick with shaking hands.

 

_i am sitting here watching gay porn are u telling me u have actually done this shit?_ he texted Patrick.

 

There were several beats of silence before Patrick replied with, _Do I even want to know what the fuck you are doing watching gay porn?_

 

_i was bored,_ Pete returned promptly. No way was he telling the actual truth. _plus u didn't answer the ?_

 

_That's because it's none of your business,_ Patrick sent back.

 

Pete made it seven entire minutes before sending Patrick another text. _i bet u have done bjs at least and maybe sex but some of this shit is pretty advanced gay. probably u are still in the beginner stages sort of._

 

This time the pause was much longer, but Patrick's eventual reply seemed more amused than annoyed. _I am in a meeting with four of our bosses right now. Could you stop narrating your gay porn experience?_

 

_no. rimming is a good example of advanced gay. i bet u have never tried rimming,_ Pete retorted, grinning at his phone in spite of himself.

 

_It would serve you right if I actually started answering these questions,_ Patrick sent back. _But instead I am turning off my phone. Go find some straight porn and amuse yourself for awhile._

 

Pete laughed, tossing his phone aside and feeling somehow less intimidated by the porn on his screen, just for having joked with Patrick about it.

 

Four hours later, Pete was pretty much a confirmed bisexual, at least in theory. Some of the stuff in the pornos was more than a little alarming, sure—and also? He didn't really understand why so many of them featured grizzly, hairy biker-looking dudes, Jesus—but a lot of it was really... _hot._ Not just in an abstract way, like how almost any porn is hot just by virtue of being porn, but, like. _Personally_ hot, in a 'wow, I want to throw Patrick down on the floor somewhere and try that,' sort of way.

 

And _that_ was a whole other series of problems, right there.

  
What was Pete supposed to do about _Patrick_?

 

There had been no repeat of that one little almost-kiss—not even so much as a hint that it might have been somewhere on Patrick's mind. And he'd kind of _said,_ hadn't he, that he'd never actually had a thing for Pete? What if Pete was going through this entire identity crisis for nothing, and Patrick wasn't even _interested?_

 

As if to mock him and his pain, the cheesy strains of porno-sax music started wailing away on his screen, followed almost immediately by a series of low grunts and moans.

  
Pete dragged a pillow up over his face, and used it to muffle his frustrated scream.

 

He was so, so fucked.

 

—

 

 

As it turned out, the answer to the question 'what was Pete supposed to do about Patrick' was, apparently, _nothing._

 

At least, 'nothing' is exactly what he _was_ doing, for whatever that was worth.

 

His re-entry into the real world, after his three-day self-imposed exile, went largely un-remarked upon, and Pete was grateful for small favors. He did a pretty good job of pretending to be normal, even if he did say so himself, and although Patrick occasionally looked at him with a spark of worry or question in his eyes, no one else seemed to notice that anything was different at all.

 

To Pete, everything felt _very_ different.

 

But as it turned out, for all of his normal outspoken, throw-it-all-down-on-the-line-and-damn-the-consequences bluster, when it came to this thing with Patrick, Pete was locked in a sort of helpless mental paralysis. He couldn't decide what to do, and ended up doing absolutely nothing instead.

  
For a fucking _month._

 

It was basically the longest month in Pete's life to date. And Pete had lived through some _unbelievably_ long months, so that was saying something.

 

Sometimes, he thought this was going to be the thing that pushed him right over that edge of crazy he'd been dancing on for so long now—treating Patrick just like always when they were alone together, and like a lover out in public. They weren't terribly overt about it, on Patrick's orders, but Pete could generally get away with holding his hand across the table, or wrapping an arm around his waist while they walked down the street or something. Patrick had this way of going sort of flaily and awkward whenever Pete did stuff like that. His face would turn pink and his eyes would start darting around like he didn't know quite where to look.

 

Pete was entirely charmed. Because Pete was _a big sappy loser._

 

Jesus, he couldn't understand how he could possibly have come to this.

 

It took the realization that the Pride concert was less than a week away for Pete to finally settle on a course of action. As usual, it was a completely insane course of action that was probably already doomed to failure.

 

But at least it was _something._ Once the day of the concert had come and gone, there would be no more reason to keep up the act.

 

So Pete gritted his teeth and tried not to climb right out of his skin as he watched the day of the concert loom closer and closer. By the time they were finally boarding a plane to New York, the day before the show, Pete felt like he could barely remember how to speak English.

 

"Seriously, dude," Patrick said to him with some concern, somewhere over, like, Nevada. "Are you okay? I've never seen you get nervous like this before a show, like, ever."

 

Pete tried to smile at him, but was pretty sure it ended up as more of a sickly grimace. "I'm fine, dude, seriously." He reached over, using the public setting of the airplane to justify taking Patrick's hand in his own.

 

Patrick got a little silly and flustered about it, like he always did, and Pete's smile felt a lot more natural that time.

 

They arrived in New York almost before Pete knew it—time was really flying now that he was so ready for it to slow down a little—and were greeted by a group of security personnel and shuttled off to their hotel with surprisingly little fanfare.

 

Pete and Patrick were assigned to a single room with a single bed, which Pete probably should have been prepared for, but it wasn't like it had to be a huge deal. Once you'd put in some time sleeping on top of your equipment in a cold van, all but snuggling your bandmates for body heat, a single king-sized bed wasn't really the shocking concept it could have been. Pete almost wished it _could_ have been a bigger deal, something that could have maybe created a little bit of sexual tension or something, opened a door to an opportunity or two, but that just wasn't the case. Patrick didn't even blink at the sight of the bed, just disappeared into the bathroom and re-emerged half an hour later freshly showered and in pyjamas. By the time Pete had finished taking his turn in the bathroom, Patrick was already in bed, sitting up with the covers draped over his legs, his laptop open and headphones on, fiddling with something on GarageBand.

 

Pete sighed, and picked up the remote control.

  
It was going to be a very long night.

 

—

 

 

The concert was beyond anything even Pete could have imagined.

  
The crowd was fucking _massive,_ and the energy level was completely insane. Pete had been ridiculously high on it before they even took the stage, and the knowledge of what he was planning to do only made him that much more manic.

 

He judged his moment carefully—they weren't doing Mr. Brightside for this one, which would have been his obvious choice, but Saturday would work almost as well. It sounded vaguely romantic, even, when you factored in the whole "me and Pete" thing, so it was as good a time as any for a crazy grand gesture. Plus it was their last song of the night, so if everything went to hell, Pete could reasonably flee the scene.

 

He spent almost the entire last half of the song playing with his forehead on Patrick's shoulder—safe, non-threatening, familiar territory, no need to alert Patrick before it was time. The instant the last note had faded from the air, Pete seized all his courage and bravado with both hands, and made his move.

 

Patrick never even saw it coming. Before he had a chance to even step back from the mic, Pete had his face cupped in trembling hands and had thrown himself forward and covered Patrick's mouth with his own.

 

Patrick froze, and under the cover of the crowd going completely fucking batshit crazy and the crash-and-squeal of their guitars being crushed together between their bodies, Pete heard him make a very small, thin sound of utter shock. Pete kept his eyes closed very, very tightly, and desperately urged Patrick's mouth open under his own.

 

He could almost _hear_ the frantic tumble of thoughts wreaking havoc in Patrick's head just then, so he was at least somewhat prepared for the way the kiss abruptly changed, as Patrick conceded to the obviously-inevitable and started kissing back.

 

And then Pete pretty much wasn't aware of anything anymore—anything but Patrick's mouth, all soft and hot and slanting over his, and Patrick's tongue sliding and twisting against his own, and Patrick's hands gripping his hips and squeezing _so tight_ , and Pete thought he could die happy if he could die at this moment, just exactly like this.

 

Patrick was the one to eventually gentle and break the kiss—Pete would have happily kept right on kissing him until the entire fucking world burned down if he'd had his own way about life—and if there was something a little bit guarded and cautious in his eyes when he looked at Pete now, Pete could almost manage not to care. Because Patrick was still here. Pete had _kissed_ him, had kissed him in front of the _whole fucking country,_ and it had been _incredible,_ and Patrick had _kissed him back._

 

Pete could have floated right off the stage and out over the crowd if it hadn't been for Patrick's hand tethering him to the ground, tugging him gently through the process of gracefully exiting the stage, leading him back to the handful of tents that had been set up inside a secured perimeter for the talent to use.

 

Several people came up to talk to them about their performance—and specifically about how romantic that kiss had been—but Pete was a little too out of his head to really be able to carry on much of a conversation. Patrick handled most of that, for once, while Andy and Joe stood by, silent and watchful, clearly trying to figure out just exactly what was happening, here.

 

Later, it would occur to Pete to be mildly embarrassed by the memory of the way he'd just stood around, beaming indiscriminately at absolutely everybody, for well over half an hour after the show. He must have looked like a fucking nutcase.

 

But it was impossible to care with Patrick's hand still warm in his, Patrick's taste still lingering in his mouth.

 

By the time he was able to pay even the slightest little bit of attention to his surroundings again, they were back at their hotel, standing outside the door of their room while Patrick fished through his wallet for the key card, and even then, the thing that finally managed to poke a little hole in Pete's hazy bubble of joy and adrenaline was the knowledge that once that door was closed behind them, they would be alone.

 

Together.

 

With a bed.

 

Anxiety and excitement were twisting and curling around each other in his stomach, and Pete felt like he could barely breathe as Patrick finally got the door open and Pete followed him into the room.

 

He wasn't sure exactly what he was expecting, but Patrick's fond, exasperated eye-roll and a dry, "You could at least have warned me, you whore," was, like, definitely _not_ it.

 

"What?" Pete said blankly. "Patrick—"

 

Patrick waved a dismissive hand. "It's fine. You honestly can't seem to help yourself, I get it. Just...y'know...it's going to make it that much weirder tomorrow."

 

"Tomorrow?" Pete really wished he had some idea of what the fuck was going on right now, but his brain wasn't capable of switching gears this fast. Part of him was still waiting for Patrick to push him up against a wall and show him just exactly how much gay-sex experience he really had.

 

"Good Morning America." Patrick waited for that to register with Pete, and when it didn't, he frowned. "Tomorrow morning? Pete, Jill set this up a _week_ ago, seriously."

 

Pete just stared at him.

 

"So that we can confess about the fake gay lovers thing," Patrick clarified in the slow, deliberate tones of someone who was talking to a very small, very stupid child.

 

Pete's heart dropped into his shoes. "But—" He paused, feeling the weight of his happy expectations come crashing down on top of him with crushing force.

 

He'd honestly forgotten the need to confess, at some point in the midst of all his mad scheming to declare himself to Patrick onstage. He'd never actually considered that it wouldn't work, that they would still only be "fake" lovers when it was all over.

 

Patrick had already gathered up his shower things and disappeared into the bathroom by the time Pete recovered from that particular punch to the stomach.

 

Patrick...hadn't gotten it. Okay, now what? Should Pete try again, here in the privacy of their own room? That was—scary, yeah, okay, but. He'd do it. He'd do anything.

 

But, okay. What if Patrick _did_ get it, but didn't, like, _want_ to? Maybe this was his way of trying to salvage their friendship and spare Pete's feelings, or avoid some mortifying scene where he had to let Pete down _gently_ or some shit.

 

The more he thought about it, the more likely that scenario seemed, actually. Seriously, Pete had _totally grabbed him and kissed him_ out there. A real, desperate, face-cupping, guitar-destroying _makeout,_ right there onstage in front of the whole entire world. Even for an attention-whore like Pete, that was excessive. Patrick _had_ to know there was more to it than that.

 

So his total silence on the subject must mean...

 

Pete's knees didn't want to hold him up anymore. He sank down onto the edge of the bed and stared very hard at the ugly-ass paisley wallpaper until the burning in his eyes and stinging in the top of his nose went away. The lump in his throat was harder to get rid of, but swallowing thickly ten or eleven times in a row seemed to do the trick.

 

He was _not_ going to turn into a chick about this, that was all there was to it. Patrick was obviously doing everything in his power to let Pete keep at least some of his dignity for once, and Pete wasn't going to repay that with a temper tantrum.

  
By the time Patrick came out of the bathroom, all damp and steaming with fogged-over glasses, Pete had managed to paste a smile onto his face and his voice only sounded a little bit weird when he said, "Jesus, dude, did you leave me any hot water at all, or what?"

 

Patrick flicked a few drops of water in Pete's general direction, missing by a mile since he couldn't see through his own glasses, and snorted. "It's a hotel, dipshit."

 

Pete threw him the finger and grabbed his own shower stuff. He was very, very proud of himself when he made it all the way in and got the door closed behind him before allowing his smile to fade.

 

Christ. He was so, so fucked.

 

—

 

Pete awoke to the familiar sensation of being stared at while he slept. He was accustomed to that sort of thing from Hemmy, but years and years of touring and traveling had drilled the smell of "hotel" so firmly into his brain that there was no longer any early-morning confusion about where the hell he was or whether the bed he was in was his own.

 

He lay very still for a long moment, not sure he wanted to see exactly what expression Patrick was wearing as he watched Pete sleep right now. If it was pity or something, Pete would be forced to kill him on the spot, and he totally did not want to be the kind of rock star that was discovered with dead bodies in his hotel room.

 

Eventually, he cracked his eyes open just enough to peer out from behind the screen of his eyelashes, and that was how he came to discover Patrick lying next to him, mere inches away, gazing somewhat dreamily at Pete's mouth.

 

Pete's breath hitched audibly in spite of himself, and he was forced to make a show of waking up while his mind raced frantically.

 

He hadn't imagined that, right? Patrick had totally been staring at his _mouth._ While he was _sleeping._ _In bed with Patrick._

 

His heart started racing in time with his mind.

 

Patrick's face had been wiped clean of any signs of any less-than-innocent thoughts he may have been having by the time Pete's eyes were properly opened, and Pete had a bizarre moment where he was certain he really _must_ have been imagining the whole thing. Patrick was actually _blinking groggily_ at him now, like he was just now waking up, himself.

 

Un-fucking-believable.

 

"Morning," Patrick mumbled, his eyes clear and friendly and sleepy and _completely fucking full of shit,_ because Pete _knew_ what he'd seen, he did, and he might be crazy, but he wasn't _delusional._

 

"Morning," he said back, searching Patrick's face for any clue that might be hiding there.

 

But there was nothing to see. Patrick dragged himself out of bed and into his clothes, idly wondering aloud if they might maybe have time for breakfast before they had to get down to the studio, and he teased Pete for wallowing in bed instead of getting up himself, and Pete really had to be reading too much into this whole thing, because he was just _Patrick,_ normal, everyday Patrick—

 

—who had been successfully hiding his sexual orientation from his best friends and bandmates since he was fifteen years old, to the point where not one of them had suspected a single thing.

 

Pete dithered and obsessed over the whole issue all the way through breakfast and down to the studio. Last night, he'd been ready to give up on the possibility that he could ever be with Patrick, because Patrick hadn't shown any signs that he wanted him back. But then he'd lain there in bed and watched Pete sleep, and stared at his mouth with a lazy and blissed-out look on his face, and maybe that meant he wasn't totally opposed to the idea of being with Pete after all, only Pete was never gonna know unless one of them _said something,_ and obviously Patrick was _way the fuck too good_ at hiding shit for Pete to assume it was ever going to be him.

 

Two minutes to showtime was not a good moment for Pete to decide to go flying off the edge of a cliff, but Pete had never been known for his stellar sense of appropriate timing. He grabbed Patrick's wrist and dragged him a few crucial feet away from the set and just...started talking.

 

"I kissed you because I meant it, yesterday. I was trying to make a grand gesture, which—fuck, maybe you got it or maybe you didn't, I should know better than to make grand gestures to you, you never react to shit the way people expect. So then I thought you were trying to—it doesn't matter what I thought, there's no time for that, the point is maybe I was right or maybe I was wrong but I love you. Like. For real, I mean. I watched gay porn and thought of you, and I held your hand and hated Joe and kissed you in front of, like, basically everybody, ever."

 

"One minute!" a tech called out to them, quietly, but Pete ignored him, keeping his eyes locked on Patrick's shell-shocked face.

 

"We have to go do this now, and I'm not, like, expecting anything from you. I know I have shitty timing, but you've always known that too, so you can't be, like, surprised. I just want you to know, because when the show is over and I can get you alone, I'm gonna be pretty much all over you unless you tell me to fuck off, so I figured you should have a chance to, you know. Prepare for that. In case you _do_ want to tell me to fuck off. I saw you watching me this morning so I'm kind of hoping you won't, but maybe I read that wrong or whatever."

 

"Thirty seconds!" the tech called, a bit more insistently. Pete threw him the finger.

 

"So there. I love you. Be prepared to...uh...defend yourself or whatever, after the show. Sorry to throw this at you right now. Let's go do this."

 

And Pete left him standing there, eyes wide and mouth open, and calmly made his way out onto the set.

 

Well. Maybe _calmly_ was an exaggeration.

 

Patrick joined him a moment later, looking slightly more composed than he had been, although he was still visibly—to Pete, at least—rattled.

 

Pete forced himself to ignore him, and summoned up a smile for Diane Sawyer, who was beaming far too perkily at him for this time of the fucking morning.

 

"So," Diane said brightly. "Welcome back! In the aftermath of the Pride in the Park concert—which was wildly successful, by the way—we just wanted to take this opportunity to have you back on the show, back to the scene of the crime, so to speak, and hear firsthand how your life has changed since you publicly came out last time you were here."

 

Pete swallowed thickly. "Yeah," he said, as steadily as he could. "Actually, that...there's something I have to confess about that. That whole thing was sort of—unintentional."

 

Diane smiled, obviously confused. "Unintentional?"

 

And here it was. Pete straightened his shoulders and bit the bullet. "Yeah, see—"

 

"We hadn't talked at all about the possibility of coming out," Patrick blurted, cutting off Pete's intended confession.

 

Pete's heart stopped. He turned and stared at Patrick, not quite able to believe this was happening.

 

Patrick reached over and grabbed his hand, his palm sweaty against Pete's. "It wasn't that we wouldn't have done it," he continued, too-bright and nervous and clearly winging it as he went along. "But you know, we really hadn't even talked to our families about it yet, and it was kind of unfair for us to do it the way we did, on TV like that. That was probably the biggest consequence we had to deal with, the guilt of having our families find out that way."

 

"Ouch." Diane made a sympathetic face. "How did they react when you got a chance to talk to them?"

 

Patrick shot him a pleading glance, so Pete forcibly pulled himself together. "Everybody was really supportive," he managed to say, although he only had eyes for Patrick right now.

 

"Well." Diane seemed a little uncertain, as though she understood that something was going on, here, but couldn't quite put her finger on what. "That's...good."

 

She exchanged a couple of glances with people off-set, but Pete wasn't really paying attention. He moved through the rest of the interview in something of a daze, and from the look of him, so did Patrick. They probably didn't make a very good impression at all.

 

Pete didn't care.

 

He walked off the set when the segment was over, feeling off-center and uncertain, himself. Hope so bright it was burning him was building in his chest, but he didn't want to leap to any more conclusions, not after last night.

 

As it turned out, he didn't have to wonder long.

 

They didn't even make it out of sight of the crew before Patrick really did push Pete up against a wall.

 

"Tell me you're serious," he murmured, and his voice—the voice that Pete had loved literally since the day they met—sent a little thrill down Pete's spine.

 

"I'm serious," he promised unsteadily.

 

Patrick smiled. "Then defend yourself," he said dryly, and captured Pete's mouth with his own.

 

And. _Fuck._ Pete just _melted,_ right there against the wall in front of God-only-knew how many people, because Patrick's mouth really was every single one of those things Pete hadn't even known he was dreaming about all these years. _Jesus._

 

They kissed for what felt like forever, but was still nowhere close to long enough, and it was only the sound of their cellphones going off in unison that finally caused them to break apart, breathing heavily and blushing like idiots.

 

Pete fumbled for his phone, grinning in spite of himself when he saw Joe's name flashing at him from his screen.

 

"This better be important, fucker, you have no idea what you just interrupted," he said into the handset.

 

Joe snickered at him. "I just wanted to say, you know, what a good thing it was you guys cleared up all that confusion. Good interview."

 

"Fuck off and die," Patrick was saying into his phone, the grin on his face making it clear that Andy must be saying something similar to him.

 

"Did you get that off your chest, then?" Pete asked Joe with a longsuffering air. "Because I'd kind of like to get back to making out with Patrick now, if you're done being a shit."

 

"Oh, hey, by all means." Joe laughed at him. "Go. Get some. Catch you later."

 

Patrick was pocketing his own phone as Pete hung up on Joe. "Hey, I have an idea," he said, beaming happily, if a little goofily, at Pete. "Let's go find them and beat them to death with their own phones."

 

"Excellent." Pete stole another quick kiss, just because he could, and slung his arm over Patrick's shoulders as they walked outside, squinting into the sunlight.

 

Almost shyly, Patrick's arm slipped up to wrap around Pete's waist in return.

 

Pete's heart did something fluttery and mushy and _completely stupid,_ and he laughed out loud in spite of himself.

 

He was so, so fucked.

 


End file.
